Not Allowed
by InASwirlofSnow
Summary: Not everyone knew from the start that Lily Evans was a witch...someone's been kept in the dark up until now.


Disclaimer: Everything is JKR's. Period.

Summary: Not everyone knew Lily Evans was a witch from the start – someone's been left in the dark up until now.

**Not Allowed**

She was preparing dinner in the kitchen when she heard her fiancé come into the room.

Cheerfully, she stopped humming and said, without looking up from the vegetables she was in the process of slicing, "I'm going to try cooking fried rice tonight. Mum said that I should learn all sorts of different types of dishes so I can make you whatever you want when we're married."

She looked up, smiling widely, and proceeded to immediately stop chopping in alarm.

"Vernon, what's wrong?" Petunia Evans exclaimed, taking in his frazzled countenance and heavy breathing. He was pulling at his mouth as if he were pulling large chunks out of a moustache – except, Petunia noted, he hadn't yet grown one bushy enough to accommodate this gesture of worry.

After a moment's silence, Vernon Dursley turned his blank stare on his soon-to-be-wife and said, "Your sister's a witch."

At his words, she paled and dropped her knife with a clatter that resounded through the silent kitchen along with his statement.

A pause, then – "What are you talking about?"

He was talking more brusquely now, coming back to his business-like self, but Petunia thought that he seemed to be looking everywhere but at her.

"I wanted to ask her something, so I went upstairs and knocked on her door."

"Why would you need to ask Lily anything?" Petunia interrupted. Her fiancé gave her a look and replied, "I wanted to know whether you really wanted petunias for the wedding, or whether you were just pulling my leg."

Petunia looked at the floor. Finally, she said, "Go on."

Vernon Dursley continued, "She didn't answer, so I thought maybe she was sleeping or something, so I opened the door a crack to check. She was dancing around and all the contents of her bloody room were whirling around her."

"Maybe you were imagining things," Petunia put in, letting out a high-pitched and shrill giggle that was about as fake as her boyfriend's pretended calm.

"She had a wand."

"Vernon," she began, wiping her hands on her apron and approaching him.

He backed away from her. "Your sister's a witch," he repeated, as if he still hadn't quite gotten the idea around his head.

Petunia Evans was beginning to feel a quiet sort of desperation creep up from the pit of her stomach. Her heart beat faster, and her breath quickened.

"Vernon," she tried again, struggling to find the right words to stop a catastrophe she knew was inevitable. "It's alright."

"She's a _witch_, Petunia. You're barking mad if you think that's alright. It's downright against Mother Nature itself. I'm calling off the wedding."

And with that, he spun on his heel and left.

Petunia leaned heavily against the countertop, gasping for air.

"Tuney – I'm so sorry." Lily had come in through the other door.

Petunia whirled on her. "Did you have to go and start doing magic the moment you turned seventeen? Couldn't you have at least waited until he was out of the house? Can't you find someone else's life to ruin?"

"I – I didn't know you hadn't told him," her beautiful, red-haired, magical sister said in a soft voice.

"Told him?" Petunia let out a derisive laugh. "You know perfectly well Vernon's the sort of man who gets irritated when his routine is only slightly interrupted or his mail doesn't arrive on schedule. Of course he would refuse the marriage the moment he found out about you – your abnormality – your freakishness."

Lily Evans said nothing.

"He probably thinks you shouldn't be allowed to exist," Petunia continued, angrily wiping her eyes. And a moment later, she venomously hissed, "And you know what? I think he's right."

And with that, Petunia fled the room in search of Vernon Dursley, leaving behind a very hurt sister with an empty ache in her heart.

**A/N: **Well, what do you think? The idea popped into my head while I was washing dishes – it had never occurred to me before, but what with Vernon Dursley being so "normal," wouldn't there have been a fuss when he found out about Lily? And I figured if her sister was nearly the cause of Petunia losing her fiancé, that might've also been another contributing factor to her resentment towards Lily and their future non-existent relationship…well, review!


End file.
